KENNETH E. HAGIN THE LIFE, TEACHINGS AND TIMES OF A GREAT MOUNTAIN MOVING GIANT OF FAITH. THE FIRST FULL BOOK LENGTH BIOGRAPHY

PASTOR NASH DAVID

 



KENNETH E. HAGIN: THE LIFE, TEACHINGS AND TIMES OF A GREAT MOUNTAIN MOVING GIANT OF FAITH. THE FIRST FULL BOOK LENGTH BIOGRAPHY

PASTOR NASH DAVID  

   

Published by New Generation Publishing in 2017 Copyright © Pastor Nash David 2017 First Edition The author asserts the moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work. All Rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior consent of the author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.



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  Unless expressly stated, all bible quotations are from the King James Version Bible.

   

   

HEBREWS 6:12 THAT YE BE NOT SLOTHFUl, BUT FOLLOWERS OF THEM WHO THROUGH FAITH AND PATIENCE INHERIT THE PROMISE.

   

   

Preamble Dennis Tinerino, the former Mr America, former Natural Mr America, four time Mr Universe and of course Arnold Schwarzenegger’s peer and fierce rival, had the privilege of meeting Reverend Kenneth E Hagin in the fledgling stages of his Christian walk. A Rhema Bible Training Center (RBTC) student, Ray McCauley, from South Africa had set up the meeting. The year is 1980. The Hagins took their celebrity guest to a nice hotel in south Tulsa for dinner. Tinerino noted that Kenneth Wayne Hagin (better known as Kenneth Hagin JuniorKenneth E Hagin’s son) was a fun loving man who had retained his boyhood east Texas drawl. His wife Lynette, was a charming and gracious lady gifted with a disarming smile. They made the celebrated Body Builder, feel at ease and feel like they were old time buddies! He found their world view mesmerising. They talked about the bible, spiritual things and God in a matter-of –fact fashion and comfortably just as other mortals talk about tea, weather and other day to day events. He had never come across people not even in church who talked in a natural and unremarkable tone about divine guidance, what the Lord had said to them and how God had spoken to them. Reverend Ken W Hagin then told Dennis Tinerino that Reverend Kenneth E Hagin felt led by the spirit to pray for him. When his Dad prayed for those seeking the Holy Ghost, they almost invariably received baptism in the Spirit immediately. Dennis could not wait. A healing service had been scheduled for that night on the Rhema campus. When they got to the Campus, a van also arrived. The van had a motorized lift which helped lower a woman in a wheel chair to the ground. Dennis asked the woman how she was doing. The woman was exuberant. She declared unreservedly that she was going to be healed that night in the name of Jesus. ‘I have got my faith out!’ she proclaimed unabashedly. 1 

 

When they walked into the auditorium, he was taken aback: thousands of people were packed inside. It was an assorted lot who sought healing: children with braces; men on crutches and ladies in wheelchairs. From his front row seat however what struck Dennis most was the earnestness and sincerity of the crowd as they sang along, danced, jumped and dived heartily into the heart of worship. The widely diverse throng was intoxicated with zeal, electric with life and the atmosphere was supercharged with enthusiasm and expectancy. A lot of Rhema College students shook hands with him, delighted to see such a well photographed and celebrated personality join the fold. Kenneth E Hagin then stood up. He talked in a folksy style. He was down to earth, gentle and unassuming. He quoted a plethora of verses on healing. Whereas Jesus came to give life in abundance, the devil had come to steal and destroy (John 10:10). The Lord wanted people to be in good health. He quoted 3 John 2 Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in good health, even as thy soul prospereth.’ The former Mr Universe noticed straight away that Brother Hagin was not trying to impress anyone. His tone was almost conversational as if addressing people on a one to one basis, like one friend to another. Yet when he opened the bible, it was with sincerity and authority that he read it. Kenneth E Hagin (KEH) emphasised that he was only a point of contact. Jesus was the healer. After quoting Peter 2:24 and a few more scriptures, he invited those who needed prayer for their healing to come forward. ‘Jesus Christ is the same, yesterday, today and forever.’ The response was tremendous as the folks thronged the platform area. Prominent among them was the Lady, the former Mr America had seen in the park. Reverend Hagin began to pray for people, laying hands on them. He laid his hands on a woman who was in front of Dennis. As soon as he touched her she began to speak in tongues. The anointing was extraordinarily strong. It was the anointing 2 

 

he had felt in his car in Los Angels when Jesus appeared and spoke to him. The wheelchair lady was at the edge of the aisle. Brother Hagin laid his hand on her forehead. ‘In the name of Jesus, be healed,’ He commanded. The moment he said ‘be healed,’ her arms shot up and she screamed. She began to tremble all over. In a few seconds her legs ‘snapped’ out straight and her feet touched the floor. In a split second she was running down the aisle. She ‘shrieked’ as she ran. The husband was ecstatic. He jumped up and down with much rapture and thanked God for the miracle. The auditorium exploded. Joy and praise reigned supreme. The former Natural Mr America, a fairly new convert wept with Joy. Literally wept. And this was the man who had mocked Kathryn Kuhlman, calling her a fake and a fool. The time came the next day for him to meet up with Reverend Kenneth Hagin Senior (KEH). Also attending the meeting was Ken JR, Pastor of the Rhema Church , Billye Brim, and a Rhema student called Mike Dalton. After a few minutes Brother Hagin asked Dennis to sit next to him. He read the book of Acts, punctuating the reading with intense explanation of the scriptures. Intense did not mean raising his voice in KEH’s book. The former Mr America was taking in every word intently. After teaching him on the importance of the Holy Spirit, Brother Hagin stood up to pray for Dennis. Dennis raised his hands instinctively and expectantly. Suddenly, inwardly he saw the face of Jesus with a crown of thorns on his head like in Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ. In Super Size Your Faith, he said ‘Then a mighty, rushing power hit me in the back my head-----the force was so tremendous that my whole body flew five feet into the air and I hurtled from one room to the other. The surge of power swept through my body, shaking me like a rag,’ [Tinerino 2006:2] 3 

 

Then he heard a voice singing. A strange voice. It was his! A new language flowed from him. He went on speaking in tongues for hours on end. Ken and his mentor Ray took him outside much, much later but he was still speaking in tongues. He ran out all over the Rhema grounds sprinting, speaking and singing in tongues. His friends laughed at his exuberance and later on bundled him into the car. He continued singing and praying in tongues. On the plane back to Los Angeles, he preached Christ to everyone. The former Mr universe was not fazed when someone in the plane said he was an ‘unlikely preacher.’ Nobody could have scripted, legislated for or foreseen the challenges -ridden and a breakthrough -drenched life of Kenneth Erwin Hagin and his unprecedented and almost unparalleled ministerial fruitfulness. The odds so heavily stacked against him, made his life a catalogue of hairraising and haranguing battles and dramatic and miraculous breakthroughs. There is the supernatural defying of death at birth; a troubled childhood against the backdrop of a dysfunctional immediate family; a deathbed and being bedfast at 16; revelation of hell and healing while bedridden; miraculous healing from an curable heart deformity and blood disease; visions of Jesus; revolutionary revelations ; gems of powerful insight into scriptures from his open cast mining of the deep meaning of the word of God hidden in plain sight to many a generations and the life changing teachings accompanied by astounding and staggering miracles. Except for media savvy spiritual giants like Oral Roberts and Pat Robertsons, it is near impossible to identify a circuit ministry which experienced the exponential growth the Hagin Ministry registered (McConnel 1995.) His is a story of a boy who trudged down country roads preaching the Gospel. Despite the arm of the Lord resting 4 

 

heavily on him and an exceedingly fruitful ministry, he was relatively unknown. He went almost unnoticed through two revivals, which he supernaturally foretold: the healing revival and the charismatic renewal revival. Despite all the severe handicaps he faced he was to be propelled into the leadership of the global church the dawn of the teaching revival. For the first time a Teacher of the word would be plucked from obscurity and planted in the forefront of a revival. Hitherto the Global Leadership of the church had been provided by powerful evangelists like Oral Roberts, Kathryn Kuhlman, Billy Graham and others of the same ilk. In the early seventies, when the Shepherding –Discipleship was still in vogue, Kenneth E Hagin Evangelistic association employed only 19 people. Barring media giants, the primetime televangelist like Oral Roberts and Pat Robertson, it is almost impossible to point out any other ministry which went on to experience growth at the hefty rate which Kenneth Hagin’s Ministry did. The growth of his ministry was phenomenal, spawning various media outlets. There was the ‘Faith Seminar of the Air’ which was the syndicated daily 15 minute radio slot was over approximately 180 US and Canadian radio stations; The faith library production has more than 65 million book copies in circulation. The Word of Faith magazine went into more than 400 000 homes. Multitudes were healed and saved through his ministry. Astounding Miracles abounded. The blind saw. Wheelchairs were emptied. Many a Leg, shorter than their companion were lengthened. He led untold thousands to the Lord. More people came to the Lord in a few days camp meeting than some churches brought to the Lord all year or decade after decade. His legacy is equally breath-taking. It is said that the sun never sets on Rhema Bible Training Centre (RBTC) 5 

 

graduates. The 40000 alumni is in every continent and in more than 20 countries. The RBTC charter class had only a handful of students: 58. It is said the sun never sets on Rhema Graduates. More than 65 million of his books are in circulation. The list of the exploits the Lord graciously granted to him is almost interminable. The blind’s sight was restored, the lame walked, cancers were cursed and dried up; many were brought back from the brink of death and mental conditions were cured. The ministry landscape is teeming with many of Reverend Hagin’s protégés such as Kenneth Copeland, Fredrick Price; Cleffo Dollar and a whole host of lesser known preachers who have gone on to be the Founding Pastors of Mega Churches. These preachers are almost invariably pigeon -holed into the much maligned yet exceedingly fruitful ‘Word of Faith Movement.’ This books looks at how KEH’s ministry dovetailed with those of Kathryn Kuhlman, Oral Roberts, Joe Cole, William Branham and many others. Still controversies raged. Allegations of plagiarism and ‘cultic origins of his teachings’ were levelled at him. Was there any merit to these claims? This work is not a simple regurgitation, or rehash and reheating of a much told tale but a deeper study into the man and the voyage of his restless spirit which pressed into the unknown, the undercurrents, the troubled yet pivotal times that that he lived in, the cultural milieu and a critique of the revolutionary and explosive teachings which transformed the spiritual landscape of many a hungry Christian’s hearts. It is a demystification of the seemingly complex confluence of ideas which impacted and fashioned the postbellum doctrine of faith, healing, peace, power and plenty. Although the research is rigorously scholarly, this is no dry intellectual discourse: it 6 

 

is meant inform; to stir the heart; furnish one with building blocks of faith and leave one transformed into a spiritual giant ready to go from victory to victory and from faith to faith. Despite the seriousness of the subject at hand, the book’s delivery is in no way typified by an excess account of solemnity. Rather on the contrary it crackles with wit and humour yet paradoxically pricks the heart, bears the abiding presence of the Lord on every page, drips with the anointing of the Holy Spirit. At last a full book length biography of this mountain moving giant of faith, a root to branch life transforming book fashioned to ground and immerse one into a deeper dimension of the faith walk with Christ and to propel one to the summit of faith where miracles abound, where there are no more binding impossibilities but rather boundless possibilities. In your personal life you must not live a defeated and frustrated Christian life, a life of ill health and a heart congested with cobwebs of broken dreams and nightmarish circumstances. In your business, career pursuits, studies and ministry YOU SHOULD BE A STRANGER TO failure, mediocrity and defeat. Reverend Hagin said God is a God Faith. He is no respecter of persons but responds to man’s faith. Like David, who by faith slew Goliath, we can stand over the challenging giants of this life and let the world see the best way to get ‘a head’ in life (pardon the pun!)

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CHAPTER ONE: BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD Oral Roberts and Kenneth E Hagin, two contemporaries and great men of God were at one time locked in a conversation when a man walked up to them and said ‘I just want to shake hands with these great competitors.’ They were not competitors- they were co-labourers in the vineyard of the Lord. Interesting circumstances surrounded their coming into the world. In the early 1900’s, in Pontococ County, Oklahoma, one’s closest neighbour was likely to be a good three to four miles away. There will be farmlands in the similitude of a wilderness between you and the neighbour. Oral Roberts’ mother was asked to go and pray for a neighbour’s child. The child had pneumonia and needed divine intervention to make it through the night. Oral Roberts’s mother took off in a hurry. She braved the stormy weather, scaled fences and farm gates and held steady against the inhospitable terrain. She told the Lord that if the child was healed and she was able to come back safely, she was going to dedicate her new child to his service and may the child have blue eyes and black hair. This was a ‘big ask’ given her Cherokee heritage! The sick child was healed, she had a safe journey. Oral came out with blue eyes and black hair. Kenneth E Hagin’s photographic memory saves him well. He would, a countless times from many a platform in the world narrate the story of how he was born prematurely on August 20, 1917. He was born in a house situated in the 900 block of East Standifer Street in McKinney Texas. The hand of the Lord was in his birth, he would note in his book I Believe in Visions. At birth he was manifestly lifeless. Writing him off for dead, the Doctor laid him on the foot of the bed leaving him for dead and electing to fight 9   

Of Kenneth E Hagin, Oral Roberts said: ‘From my heart I want to say D.R Kenneth Hagin is one of the best friends I have ever known---. A mighty man of God. No one in my estimation surpasses Dr Hagin’s ministry whose anointing has reached deeply into the lives of more young lives and more souls. When I am with him or listening to him on the radio or television or in person, I feel like I am in the presence of a Prophet. His ministry of word of knowledge, discernment and gift of faith….. was unsurpassed in our generation.’ AT LAST THE FIRST FULL BOOK LENGTH BIOGRAPHY OF THIS MOUNTAIN MOVING GIANT OF FAITH. The book charts his life journey from the rugged paths of McKinney, Texas, right through the eventful William Branham -led Healing Revival up to his position in the forefront of the Word of Faith Movement. Pastor Nash David lives in Leeds with his wife Jane, and is the founding Pastor of The Household of Faith Church.

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